However, some MPs will warn the changes, intended as guidance for the courts, will be ineffective against judges and only a wholesale change in law will force them to act.

Damian Green, the immigration minister, said: “For too long, foreign nationals convicted of serious offences in the UK have been able to use weak human rights claims to avoid deportation.

“Today – for the first time – Parliament will set out when, in its view, the rights of the law abiding majority should outweigh a foreign criminal's human rights claims.”

The move comes amid concern that it is too easy for a foreign criminal to claim a right to family life and avoid deportation.

They include Raja Mohammed Anwar Khan who was jailed for six and a half years, reduced to five on appeal, after killing another motorist in a road accident after getting behind the wheel high on heroin.

The Pakistani immigrant convinced an immigration judge that the presence of his wife and children in Britain and his close relationship with his parents meant he should stay.

Rohan Winfield, from Barbados, was jailed for three years for twice raping a young woman after leaving his wife for a mistress.

He was allowed to stay after arguing it would breach his human rights to separate him from the three children he fathered with his wife – whom he had abandoned – and another child he fathered with his Spanish mistress, while awaiting trial for the offence.

In 2011, some 185 foreign criminals successfully used the right to family life to stay and last week Mrs May said British judges were even softer than their European counterparts on human rights rulings.

The Home Office has now drawn up new immigration rules to rebalance the weight given to family life.

They come in to effect next month but Mrs May wants the backing of parliament as an extra incentive to judges to abide by them.

The rules say anyone from outside the European Economic Area who is jailed for at least four years should “almost always” face deportation and only “in exceptional circumstances” will family life or the interests of a child outweigh their criminality.

Those jailed for between one and four years, or persistent offenders jailed for less than a year should normally be deported unless they meet strict new criteria.

They include being in a genuine and lasting relationship, lived here for at least 15 years and leaving would pose “insurmountable obstacles” on the relationship.

Those with children who are British or lived here for seven years would have to show it would be unreasonable for the youngster to leave and there is no other family member who could look after them.

Dominic Raab, the Tory MP, said: “Ministers are absolutely right to target spurious claims to the right to family life by criminals to trump deportation orders.

“But, if we're serious about tackling the problem we will need primary legislation.”